A/N: Before this story begins, I would like to say a HUGE thanks to Kenitoh Menara for giving me permission to write and publish this story. Please, if you haven't, read his fanfic Rosa's New Perspective that inspired this whole story. I want to give him full credit for the idea of this story to him. And of course I don't own pokemon either. I only own Emily, my OC.
She was all he could see. Her figure was all he could see in the blinding storm. She was distant in reality, but clear in his mind's eye.
The pounding sound of thunder echoed in Oliver's head. The rain pounded onto his body. As a result, his breathing was heavy and erratic.
Oliver had been tracking this girl down for the past two months, and from taking just a small glance of the pictures from her last sighting, she was in desperate need of help. Even in this storm he could see her frail figure desperately running for what she thought was her life. If only she knew she was running away from it.
Shouting and calling after the girl was useless not only because the storm was loud enough to drown out an exploud's shout but because she was also unreceptive. She was ignorant to the help she needed.
Her head too was also pounding, but with actual pain. She was in dire need of food and warmth, but her stubborn nature wasn't letting her give in to the pokemon that destroyed her entire life. She seethed with anger every time she thought of pokemon. And at that very moment her teeth were grinding at the sight of the pokemon following her.
They both climbed higher and higher up Mt Chimney, the rain only seeming to torment them both all the more. Oliver had the advantage of being larger and being a water type, making him faster in the rain. But this time he felt the full force of the pressure of battling for someone's life. It was either he give up and let her die, or they both get down safely and her have a chance at a new life.
However, it seemed the storm above them wasn't keen on either and a bolt of lightning leapt out of a dark, brooding cloud. It hit the side of the mountain they were running near, and cracks ran along the edges.
Soon enough, rocks came tumbling down, making the once fearless and determined girl stand to a halt. She looked up with wide eyes and stumbled as she tried to escape the oncoming rockslide. She now looked like a child, her stubborn demeanour wiped away in the blink of an eye.
The pokemon following her also stopped too. However, his skills as a result of battling allowed him to smash the rocks with ease. The poor girl he was venturing after wasn't quite so lucky. She screamed deafeningly, the sound now clear above the storm and avalanche.
Oliver leapt forward and ponded his fist against the rock above her, his heart hammering and everything seemingly in slow motion. He landed on the ground masterfully, and looked over at the girl, backing away from him. He was so close to her, closer than he had ever been before.
However, this moment was short lived as a rock no smaller than a soccer ball hit the girl on the head. She collapsed to the ground in a heartbeat, a small pool of blood forming below her.
Oliver's heart missed a beat as he dashed forward. He scooped up the girl's now even paler form and sheltered her in an embrace.
"You're safe now, Emily." His gruff voice said, though he doubted she could hear him. "You'll be okay."
My body felt different that morning. I couldn't quite figure out why, but I felt something I hadn't in months. Then it hit me, in a wave of part relief, part panic. I felt warm. I tried to wrack my brain to ponder what that meant. Some part of me felt like that was a bad thing.
My eyes shot open, as if a bolt of lightning had been shot through my body. All I could see was white, and one hazy figure. For a moment I thought I had actually died, but when my vision had cleared, the sight for me was even more terrifying. A smiling lopunny looked down at me, holding out a cup of water.
"Lopun punny pun lop." It said softly, but I didn't understand a word it was saying.
I sat up quickly and backed away, a sharp pain in my head making me wince. I wasn't sure why I was scared, I only knew that I was and that I trusted that feeling. Every part of my body ached like I had been twisted into a pretzel. The lopunny seemed to see this and attempted to calm me down. But as I didn't speak the language of the pokemon, it had little impact on my hyperventilating.
I pulled up my knees against my chest and closed my eyes tight. I tried to remember something, anything but nothing came up, like my memory was deleted. A small hand was placed on my shoulder, and through the tears I looked up, still choking for breath. The lopunny was rubbing my back supportively with a smile that my mother used to give me. I stopped sobbing and choking and gazed at the tray she was holding.
There was a single glass of water, and a little pill with a note that read, 'this will allow you to understand me'.
I hesitated in reaching out my hand. As if the pokemon was controlling me, I took the pill and swallowed the pill with a single gulp of water. The cool liquid felt refreshing and I almost sighed in relief.
Soon the noise the pokemon was making slowly morphed into words I could understand.
"Lopunny pun lo punny… are lopun alright? Please lopunny calm down punny lo. You will be alright young one."
I slowed down my breathing and coughed a little. The fact that this pokemon was actually talking to me took a while to settle in. I wasn't quite sure how I knew that they usually didn't, and that made me worry. I rubbed my eyes clear of the tears and downed the rest of the water.
"Careful, you might choke." Giggled the lopunny. I looked over at her badge on the pink nurse uniform she was wearing. It said her name was Francine.
"Francine?" I said, my voice hoarse.
She nodded and placed the tray on a nearby table.
"Yes that is my name honey. Pokemon have names like humans, since we can't exactly call each other lopunny 46 or tyranitar 59." She joked. I chuckled, something it felt like I hadn't done in a while.
Then, the door creaked open, to reveal a swampert walking in. I gasped as it looked threatening to me, and some part of me hated it. I once again backed up against the bed and started to shake.
"No darling, don't worry." Francine comforted me, holding my hand tight. "That's just Officer Aquaheart. He's the one that rescued you."
"Rescued me?" I mumbled, looking confused.
"It's nice to see you are alright, Emily." Officer Aquaheart said, in a tired, gruff voice.
"Who's Emily?" I said in a worried tone. He seemed familiar but I couldn't work out why, and I got quite flustered.
Francine gave the swampert a look and bustled him out of the room.
"Please leave darling, she can't remember anything and I don't want her to stress herself too much."
She turned around and sighed.
"Is he your…?" I ventured. She nodded.
"My fiancé." She said. "Please don't be scared of him, he did rescue you after all."
"But I can't remember anything. Who is he? Who are you? Who am I…?" I exclaimed, a sudden burst of panic pumping through my veins. A look of shock was now clear on her face, and she looked stumped at what to say.
"I'm sorry." I said. "I just want to remember."
My voice wavered and sounded scared. Francine's expression softened and placed her paw on my shoulder once again.
"It's alright dear. I'm sorry you feel that way. We'll do our best to get your memory back. You seem to have amnesia from a rock that hit you on the head when we were tracking you down. But don't worry, just rest and recuperate as we do the work."
She left, and I slowly fell asleep, thinking of what she said. I was worried as I wanted to know why I was here and how I got here, but Francine and Officer Aquaheart's obvious care and concern for me put my mind at rest. My head hurt badly, but despite that, I fell asleep calmly, weirdly dreaming no dreams.
Francine gave a sympathetic look as she left the room. She saw her fiancé pacing around the corridor, a troubled look strewn across his face. His mouth was biting his tongue in frustration. She walked over to him silently, and placed her paw on his back in comfort.
"I didn't mean to be so forceful." He grumbled, pulling her into a tight hug.
"It's fine Oliver." She said, her voice muffled by the embrace. "She's just afraid. I would be to if I couldn't remember anything."
"That's what the adoption agency is for Francine." Oliver replied, pulling away from the hug. They both sat on the two lonely plastic chairs together, their hands entwined. "But I guess it does all seem a bit sudden for her. Does she have a social worker?"
Francine shook her head.
"Angela was supposed to be hers but another child came in and she was given him. The agency just assumed a lot of couples wanted to adopt her."
"Well how many couples applied?" Oliver asked.
"I asked the matron that runs this hospital and she said quite a few. There is apparently big interest in her. Of course there's the situation with babying."
"Isn't all humans against babying at first?" Inquired Oliver.
"Yes, but all of them want to use aggressive babying against her."
"That's awful." Snapped Oliver. "They shouldn't force babying on her if she doesn't want it."
Francine smiled and squeezed his claw.
"You know sweetie," cooed the bunny pokemon. "I think you'd make a great dad."
Oliver blushed, and the red colour was made even more prominent by his blue face.
"I don't know Francine," he moaned. He had had this conversation quite a few times with his fiancé, but only wanted kids after they got married. However with less than a month to go before the big day, Francine had been discussing the idea of a baby more and more. She wanted first to have her own child, but working as a nurse was tiring.
"I don't think I'd be a good dad. I mean look at what I did to that poor kid I rescued. I scared her half to death."
He looked over at Emily's room. The door had a small window in it and through it he saw the girl, sleeping soundly on her bed. She looked so small and frail, as if the slightest touch would shatter her into a million pieces. Through her thin nightgown, Oliver swore he could see her ribcage.
"But I do want to give her what's best for her." He finished in a quiet tone, as if not wanting his fiancé to hear. However, Francine heard loud and clear.
Her mind starting to whirr as she thought of her situation. Oliver was going to move in with her as she had a two bedroom house. She was currently living there but hardly used any of the rooms. She worked long hours and probably couldn't look after a baby. But, she could look after someone that could feed and wash themselves. The only problem was that Francine didn't Emily to run away if she suddenly remembered everything.
Francine went back to work, planning in her mind. As a couple, she and Oliver could afford her not working at all for months. He was being promoted as a sergeant very soon, and the human adoption agency gave money as well if a couple were to adopt but not have enough resources. After all, if Francine continued working as a human nurse whilst the child was under her care, she would hardly spend any time with her, and there was a huge chance of her running away.
She had quickly sent a text to Oliver asking his opinion and if it was alright to adopt before their marriage. The only problem was that she didn't have the child's information yet. She would need that to adopt her.
Just before dinner time, she had approached the matron of the hospital, Mrs Honeydew. She was a married vespiquen with her own adopted human child as well as a pokemon child. For this reason she was voted matron of the human children hospital, as she knew an awful lot about childcare. The hospital was working with the HAA HQ so she was the one to receive all the information on the children in her care.
Francine knocked on her door, and waited for the okay to go in. As expected, a sweet sounding voice sounded out.
"Come in!"
The lopunny entered the room and smiled. Mrs Honeydew mirrored it, and gestured to a chair.
"Good afternoon Nurse Francine. What would you like to discuss?"
Francine sat down and breathed in. She always felt nervous talking to her superiors.
"I was wondering if you had any more information on the girl that was brought in a few days ago. I was wondering if any couples had applied for adoption as of late. I know you said not many have, but I pondered if there is any more."
Mrs Honeydew nodded and started to type something into her computer.
"I don't usually reveal such information with nurses but as you seem to be the only pokemon she trusts I will give you what I know." Mrs Honeydew stated. The computer seemed to load for a few seconds, then a page appeared, with the girl's picture on it. "We found her DNA and it revealed her whole life basically. Her name is Emily."
Francine remembered Oliver saying that when he had met the child. She knew they had got her name from her pokemon trainer records.
"She is twelve years old. She was a pokemon trainer, and a good one at that. She had a full team of pokemon and became Champion of Hoenn for a few months before someone else beat her."
Francine couldn't believe her ears.
"Really?"
"Yes. It also says that she had a history with organisations like Team Aqua and Team Magma. She apparently helped with attacks and beat them in battles."
"Wow." Murmured Francine to herself.
"As for the couples that want to adopt her, there have been a few more that applied."
"What are their approaches regarding her behaviour towards the new way of life?"
"Sadly all want to turn her into a baby and will use aggressive babying too. I'm sure that won't be pleasant for the poor child."
"Could I put another form in?" Francine asked, nervously grabbing at her long ears.
"Of course, I could do it right now if you want. You can sign a paper one, and I'll log it up onto her file." Mrs Honeydew responded. "I hope I'm correct in assuming that you and Oliver are considering adopting this girl."
Francine nodded slowly. She quickly whipped out her phone. Oliver had responded.
Oliver: I would love to adopt her. I just don't know if she'd ever like me as a dad.
She typed out a response, as Mrs Honeydew searched around her office for a paper form.
Francine: She will learn Oliver. Please. I'm signing the form now under my name, so she's just mine until we get married, then she's ours.
Oliver: Okay, I trust you.